


the other trousers

by insertcleveracejoke



Series: the other trousers AU (tell a story, make history) [1]
Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Gen, I didnt write this at 3 AM but I might as well have done, Im actually quite proud of this one, M/M, a pocket clock is somehow involved, about History and stories, about happy endings, kind of like poetry, the other trousers of time, this is more like a prologue really, this is something of an AU and I might or might not write more, welcome to my mind's late philosophy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-08-03 19:37:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16332155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/insertcleveracejoke/pseuds/insertcleveracejoke
Summary: Sir Samuel Vimes didn't think a throwaway comment about his younger self would make a difference, and in fact it didn't. Not in his leg of the Trousers of Time. He did the job that was in front of him, came back to his own future, his wife and son, his life. It wasn't a happy ending, no, but it was happy. It was worthwhile. That Samuel Vimes wouldn't have traded that life for anything in the world and he was right, because that was the life he chose. That was the story he was telling himself and he liked that one.But there were other Sams in other worlds. And there were other Vetinaris.





	the other trousers

The thing about History is that it is what people make of it.

Oh, yes, there's patterns, but people created them. There's patterns everywhere if you look hard enough. The world is a story we tell ourselves and hope it has a happy ending. (There's no happy endings, not really, because there are no endings. The only thing you can do is try to be as happy as you can and hope that it's enough.)

(It never is. But if this is a story...)

(If this is History...)

You can talk about History always following it's course until your mouth is dry. You can give a lecture on why things always happen the way they have to. And yet the fact remains- details change. Details change because this is a story and we might tell the same story over hundreds of years, we might write it again and again, and it'll still be the same story in essence, but the story you end up with is always that little bit different from the one you started. History doesn't care about the details.

People do.

Sir Samuel Vimes didn't think a throwaway comment about his younger self would make a difference, and in fact it didn't. Not in his leg of the Trousers of Time. He did the job that was in front of him, came back to his own future, his wife and son, his life. It wasn't a happy ending, no, but it was happy. It was worthwhile. That Samuel Vimes wouldn't have traded that life for anything in the world and he was right, because that was the life he chose. That was the story he was telling himself and he liked that one.

But there were other Sams in other worlds. And there were other Vetinaris.

Look at the pocket lock the Vetinari we know has. Look at it carefully. See how he always takes care to not let anyone see it, not even Drumknott, and wonder why. (I'll tell you why). Watch as he only looks at it when he's completely alone and see- oh, yes, see the date engraved in the inside of its lid.

You're not surprised, are you, to see the date of the day John Keel supposedly died? Vetinari wears lilacs in his lapel once a year. He visits the grave when no one is looking. He once visited it when someone was, and found in the face of the watchman he trusted with his life the scar of the man he once... But Sam Vimes was married. He had his happiness.

(See? There are no truly happy endings. This is not a fairytale.)

(And yet...)

Look at the pocket clock the Vetinari in the other leg of the Trousers owns. See how only one man besides him saw it and lived to tell himself that story.

See how there's another date beside Keel's death.

See how this Vetinari might have not had a happy ending, but he's happy. (Ask him if it's enough. He won't tell you, but this is the story he's telling himself: It is.)


End file.
